French appeals court upholds ruling against iPhone exclusivity

A French appeals court has thrown out France Telecom's attempt to restore its exclusive rights to the iPhone, upholding a December ruling handed down by competition regulators.

France Telecom's wireless carrier Orange signed a five-year deal with Apple to carry the iPhone 3G, leading rival mobile phone service provider Bouygues Telecom to file a complaint last September joined by its fellow competitors.

On Dec. 17 the Competition Council sided with Bouygues, saying the deal risked "serious and immediate damage" to competition because of its "excessive" length and that all future iPhone agreements would be capped at a maximum of 3 months. Both Apple and Orange appealed.

However, the appeals court has denied the two partners in today's ruling, available in this French-language PDF. France Telecom told Reuters it plans to file another appeal with the Cour de Cassation, the highest court in France.

Bouygues Telecom, which is the No. 3 mobile operator in the European country, welcomed the ruling and indicated company officials are already engaged in negotiations with Apple to sell iPhones linked to its own network.

"With this decision, Bouygues Telecome will soon offer the iPhone as soon as the conditions for distribution (are) finalized with Apple," the company said in a press release translated from its original French. "This decision is a significant step forward for consumers who can now choose freely."

So, Apple can't choose who it can sell it's products to now?
I hope they at least get to demand things like visual voicemail to be implemented first... that's a part of the iPhone experience.
From my past experience, Bouygues sucks big time.

Naturally Orange will earn less revenue if rival carriers are allowed to sell the iPhone, so i wonder now that the deal isn't Exclusive, will Orange need to revisit the agreement in terms of payments to Apple.

Reading over the decision...
It looks like Bouygues saw that Orange (FT) was selling TONS of phones and losing subscribers, so they asked Apple to let them sell iPhones. Apple has (or had now) contracts for 5 years with Orange, so they said no.

Bouygues filed suit.

In the judgment, they talk about the ipod and how much of the market it has, and that music was wrapped in Apple's DRM - not that that should have anything to do with the iPhone being sold by Orange exclusively... then is says that that doesn't matter much anymore (not that it should have anyways) since Itunes is going non-DRM.

Then, it says that Orange made 140 million euros but only invested 16.5 million. So, obviously, that's "largely disproportionate"! Shame on them for making a great investment when no one else would!!

The judgment then states that there was not a risk that Orange would lose money because Apple is well known in the tech world and the iPhone was a hit in America.

Orange is having too much success in the limited (voluntarily by the government!) mobile phone market.

Therefore, apparently, there is an iPhone market, and Orange has (had) a monopoly.
3-6 months is ok, but 5 years is not ok.

So, when can I go to a BP gas station and get Fina gas if I choose? How about going to Auchan and getting Cora brand chips? I am a consumer merde! Give me what I want!

This won't make a bit of difference. They will charge way more money for the iPhone through other carriers. I'm sure someone will buy them, but the masses will still flock to Orange or the reasonable pricing.